[78-L] I Hear Dead People (was: (no subject))

[Michael Biel]

Stephen Davies wrote:
>         Writing in a philosophical mood, and knowing that there can be 
> only speculation, without an absolute answer....  Recorded immortality 
> hand in hand with mortality.
>
>         I was wondering about how TV kicked into high gear in the 1950's, 
> and the late nights were filled with old movies, even some silents.... How 
> the TV audience at some point in time (1958, 1959, 1960....?) would 
> realize that many of these early actors were now dead.  Any ghoulish 
> feeling might be mixed with an engrossing plotline and/or a blossoming 
> sense of camp based on the style and foibles of previous generations.  (I 
> don't think people were mislabelling it "Nostalgia" yet.)
>   

At that time many of the performers, even from the silent era, were NOT 
dead!!  They were alive and well and being interviewed by Joe Franklin 
on "Down Memory Lane".  Remember, more time has passed since the 1950s 
than had passed then from the beginnings of popular movies in the 
mid-teens.  Our Gang and Keystone Kops flickers were only 20 to 35 years 
old then.  Richard Lamparski started doing his books and radio shows 
"What Ever Happened To . . ." around 1964-65.  William B. Williams was 
playing Big Bands on WNEW.  Charlie Michaelson was syndicating "The 
Shadow" and other then recent Old Time Radio shows, some of them had 
been off the air only ten years!!!  Sophie Tucker made many appearances 
on Ed Sullivan.  She made CYLINDERS, for Pete's sake.  Jimmy Durante 
hosted "Hollywood Palace" every few weeks, in color, with the Lenon 
Sisters.  He recorded for GENNETT for Pete's sake.  The only thing that 
was ghoulish was John Zacherlie, and even he is still alive NOW!!!  (He 
doesn't need the makeup any more, however.)   


>         So was there a similar watershed moment in the history of 78's, 
> when people realized that the majority of recorded sound belonged to 
> deceased personalities?  Or was the 78 rpm era based always on new songs, 
> new styles without any retrospective similar to the TV programming and no 
> sentimental prickings?
>   

We started thinking of it around the year of the centennial of recorded 
sound, 1977.  I wrote an ARSC Journal column in 1978 about the 1977 
deaths of recording artists.  (You can read it on the ARSC-Audio.org 
website.)  1978 was the final year of the Edison Site Pioneer Performers 
Concert.  We were starting to lose all of them, and those who were left 
were becoming very infirm.  Those of us who were younger collectors felt 
privilidged to have been able to meet Gladys Rice, Willie Robyn, Edna 
White, Douglas Stansbury, Ernest L. Stevens, Douglas Stanbury, Paulo 
Gruppe, and several others.  And we started to realize that many other 
performers of the acoustical era had only died recently (such as in the 
1960s) and we could have met them if we knew how.  Roy Evans became good 
friends with Annette Hanshaw.  A college chum's mother played cards 
weekly with Ruth Etting and got me an autographed photo.  And several 
collectors met and even recorded Irving Kaufman. 

To be frank with you, what seems the most ghoulish is looking thru 
photographs from the 1800s, both on the web and looking thru boxes of 
anomymous family photos at flea markets and collectors shows.  These are 
ordinary people who look like everybody else you know.  If you look 
beyond their fashions and hairdos, and just look at the faces, it is 
awestriking.  And nobody knows who they are.  Then to be VERY frank with 
you, what is even more unnerving (if you start THINKING about it) is 
looking at the 150 year old photos of nudes--ALL long dead--and the 
nudie magazines before 1950 when if any of them are alive they are 
between 80 and 110!  And the nudie magazines of my youth show women (or 
men when we see the nudist magazines) who are my age or older.  YIKES.  
They were so YOUNG!!!!

Mike  Biel   mbiel at mbiel.com 
>         There seems to be a great sense of addressing posterity in the 
> earliest Edison recordings.  At some point, recorded sound became so 
> common that it was just a consumeable moment rather than a historic event. 
>  When did discs regain the status of  being a legacy?  I presume the 
> answer depends on what genre of recording is being considered:  classical, 
> popular, spoken word...
>
> - Stephen D
> Calgary
>